Netflix employees won't return to the office until a "majority of people" are vaccinated, according to Reed Hastings.
In a new interview with The Wall Street Journal's Joe Flint, the Netflix founder and co-CEO discussed how the company's employees have fared during the coronavirus outbreak and what he expects the future to look like. He said he's eager to get back to the office and that he doesn't see an upsides of remote work.
"No. I don't see any positives," Hastings told the Journal. "Not being able to get together in person, particularly internationally, is a pure negative. I've been super impressed at people's sacrifices."
Hastings said debating ideas has been the most difficult aspect of Netflix's culture to maintain as employees shifted to remote work. He also said that he expects going forward, most companies will shift to a four-day workweek model, where employees report to the office for four days and work remotely on the fifth.
In terms of when Netflix employees will return to work, Hastings said it won't happen until there's a coronavirus vaccine, jokingly saying employees will report to the office "12 hours after a vaccine is approved" before saying workers will likely return six months after there's a vaccine.
"Once we can get a majority of people vaccinated, then it's probably back in the office," Hastings said.
Hastings is the first major tech CEO to mention a coronavirus vaccine as a factor in returning to the office. Most US-based tech companies shifted to remote work in March, and none of them have sent their full workforce back to the office. Amazon and Microsoft aren't expecting employees to return to work until January, while Google and Facebook have both said employees won't be expected to return until next summer. Twitter has said that employees may work from home forever if they'd like.
If Hastings sticks to the timeline he mentioned to the Journal, Netflix employees may be waiting at least another year to return to the office: One expert told Business Insider's Andrew Dunn that a vaccine could become widely available to Americans in April, May, or June of 2021, meaning Netflix employees would start returning to work toward the end of 2021.
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